


Flashes

by TurtleTotem



Category: Captain Marvel (2019)
Genre: F/F, Kissing, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-28
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-12-25 20:54:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18269168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TurtleTotem/pseuds/TurtleTotem
Summary: There's so much Carol can't remember -- but she's pretty sure she and Maria weren't just friends.





	Flashes

Monica had not wanted to go to bed, had refused to even hear of it unless Auntie Carol tucked her in, read her a story, brought her water, sang her a lullaby.

"Child, you are eleven years old, you do not need a bedtime story," Maria tried to say, but Vers—Carol, her name was Carol—was happy to do it. Her only worry was that she didn't remember any Earth songs well enough to sing them all the way through. Monica's lullaby ended up being a Kree timekeeping chant. She didn't seem to mind; she fell asleep halfway through it.

Afterward, instead of joining the intense conversation Fury and the Skrulls seemed to be having in the dining room, Carol went outside. She sat down on the porch steps, looking up at the stars, as humidity settled onto her skin and some kind of nocturnal insect—hordes of them, it sounded like—sang in the woods around them.

"Crickets," Carol said, hearing Maria open the door and step toward her across the porch. How did she know Maria's steps? How did she know what crickets were?

"Yep," Maria said, sitting down next to her. "They sound beautiful out there. Not so beautiful when there's one in the house with you."

Carol closed her eyes and listened. Maria's arm brushed hers as she shifted position.

"Have I ever been to Louisiana before?" Carol asked.

"No. You grew up in New England," Maria said.

New England. The words brought an impression of chilly rain, grey streets, red leaves.

"The Air Force moved you to Florida," Maria continued, "and then California. I grew up here, but I didn't visit much while I was serving. Family didn't approve of… a lot of things." Carol glanced at her sideways; Maria was staring out into the darkness, her mouth tight. "So we weren't close then. But after you died, I… I needed them. I needed to come home."

Carol watched the sadness in her face, remembered a flash of something—Maria crying, wiping her face, hanging up on her mother. Remembered her own arms around Maria, tight, protective, hair against her cheek.

Here and now, their arms were still touching.

Carol swallowed. "Maria. Some of the flashes I see when I think of you…" Her voice failed. She had to clear her throat and start over. "I know we were friends, best friends, but were we… Were we…"

"Yeah," Maria whispered, her smile shy and uncertain. "We were. You couldn't talk about it then, either. Said you didn't want labels and b.s. like that." She rolled her eyes, indulgent. "Not that we coulda told anyone anyway, we'd have been drummed out of the Air Force."

They were together. They _were._ Carol had had someone like Maria, warm and kind and solid and beautiful, and then she'd _died_ on her _._ And come back… like this, different, not remembering. How could she forget someone like Maria? "I'm sorry." Her voice came out as a croak. "I'm so sorry. I never would have left you on purpose." She'd been taken, taken away and lied to—

"I know that, honey!" Maria slid an arm around Carol's shoulders, hesitantly at first, then tightly when Carol leaned into the embrace. "I'm just so happy you're alive! Hell, even if we all die tomorrow, I'm glad you didn't die that day. I'm glad you got to have a few more years. The universe is a much poorer place without you in it. Trust me, I know."

Carol couldn't speak. She hid her face in Maria's shoulder, where the smell of engine grease, hair lotion, and Maria's skin was a shock of familiarity, tied to a thousand memories that danced just beyond the reach of her conscious mind. This had been her favorite smell in the whole world. It still was.

"Have you been okay?" Maria asked, shaky. "Have you been happy, with them?"

Carol hesitated. "Yes. I guess. Kree culture isn't the most warm and cuddly, especially Star Force, but… I had my commander, my team." She grimaced, pulling back to rub her face as if it hurt. It didn't; the pain was deeper than that. "Right now I don't want to think about how much they knew. But they were good to me, in their way. I've learned things from them, and I didn't hate my life. I was okay." Anger flared, and she felt her fist thump against the wooden porch. "But I knew things were missing. I knew! I knew there was supposed to be more! I had dreams, all the time—nightmares, but sometimes they weren't nightmares, sometimes they were… you. You and Monica. You and beer and dancing and flying. Home."

"Home." Maria pulled Carol's hand off the porch's edge, laced their fingers together. Pressed Carol's knuckle to her lips. "What is it that you see, in the flashes, that made you ask about… us? What do you remember?"

"A lot of little things." Carol couldn't look away from their entwined hands. "One… big thing. A tent, red and yellow. On a mountain, looking out over this beautiful lake, stone peaks and trees. The air felt so clean there. And cold, but you were warm..." Carol felt her face flush; unable to finish, she bit her lip and looked away.

Beside her, Maria made a sound—a laugh that snagged on its way out, threatening to become a sob. Only in that laugh, a glimpse of happiness in the place where the pain parted, could Carol really see how much all this shock and confusion was hurting Maria. "Our first kiss," Maria said. "You're remembering our first kiss. We were camping in Yosemite. You remember!"

"I wish I remembered more," Carol said. "More of kissing you. There's so much I've lost."

"Hmm." Maria smiled, shyly playful. "I might have some replacements available?"

"Oh," Carol said, blinking. "That would be great."

And it _was_ great, warm and solid and beautiful like Maria, soft and sweet and gentle—when was the last time she had felt anything gentle?

She wasn't sure how long it took them to hear Fury clearing his throat on the porch behind them.

"When you're, uh, done here," he said, one eyebrow raised, "we have a plan we need your input on."

"Sure. Be right there," Carol said, and didn't move, watching Fury steadily until he backed away and went inside.

Maria was laughing, head against Carol's shoulder. "Yep. It's you."

"It's me." Carol tipped her chin up and kissed her one last time. "I guess we do have to go inside. Got a day to save and all that. Can't expect the menfolk to handle it alone."

Maria laughed again. "Higher further faster, baby."

They went inside holding hands, and among the things Carol had forgotten was how it felt to smile like this, a smile that seemed to take up her whole body, too big for her to hold, a rush that rivaled flying.

_Higher further faster._


End file.
